Mercedes Webb-Pullman



Light in the dark

There’s a center to almost everything -
this girl on the couch who’s listening,
that ladder leaning against a tree,
knuckle and finger and paper -
a mixture of opulence and mystery.

Tin cans of flowers and organ music
like a train with a broken arm; mourners
are ants swarming onto bones
from under a mockingbird’s wing.

Where was the park we walked through?
I think of you by thinking of water,
spring flowing in autumn, a special tension,
a screened porch on an Eastern beach.

I remember you under trees
that shook as they took you, green
parrots looping between buildings.
The waterfall fell and the river went.
They all leave, whatever they’re called.

Sea-mist rounds the headland,
the greenish rush of it
scatters the trees’ bruised shadows.
Days are always beautiful
where the earthy things play.

Part of growing up is pain and painful;
attending funerals like a wet nurse.
Sunlight through a window haloes
each of these one hundred and thirty-six people.

The sign says grave-digging, two bodies a day
cupped orchard green against unendable blue.
The room fills with warm liquid; light
or has night fallen already?

Mercedes Webb-Pullman: IIML Victoria University Wellington New Zealand MA in Creative Writing 2011. Published in: Turbine, 4th Floor, Swamp, Reconfigurations, The Electronic Bridge, poetryrepairs, Connotations, The Red Room, Otoliths and her books Numeralla Dreaming, After the Danse, Food 4 Thought, Looking for Kerouac, Ono and Bravo Charlie Foxtrot.
 
 
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